Visual Communication Fundamentals: Design, Imagery, and Language

Visual Communication Concepts

Functions of Images

• Informative: Images focus your message to convey information (e.g., traffic lights).
• Expressive: Images evoke and cause our feelings.
• Aesthetic: Images communicate their focus mainly through beauty and harmony.
• Representational: Images depicting reality, created by humans. They are divided into two types: those created from the author's imagination and those that copy or interpret reality.
• Persuasive: Focuses on the receiver, hoping they are seduced by the message content; these are creative.

Visual Communication Language (VCL)

The visual language used exclusively by images to communicate. It presents a great advantage compared to other languages: it can be interpreted by most people, even those with different cultures and languages. Examples include traffic signals and road maps.

Signs and Symbols in Communication (SSCV)

From the 20th century, there was a need for conventional language signs that allowed messages to be captured quickly and easily by many people.

Sign

A simple image that represents an object or idea, conveying information to understand its representation.

Symbol

A representation of reality in an abstract way, based on ideas that must be known to understand its meaning.

Design Disciplines

• Graphic Design
• Industrial Design
• Architectural Design
• Interior Design
• Textile Design
• Fashion Design

Art and Design Movements

Modernism

A movement initiated at the end of the 19th century and lasting until the beginning of the 20th century. Characterized by the great importance given to decoration, applicable to any type of object. It was influenced by romantic and nationalist currents of the second half of the 19th century. Examples include Mackintosh, Guimard, Horta, and Wagner.

Bauhaus

The most famous art and architecture school of the 20th century, instrumental in the modernization process of industry.

Image Rhetoric and Cinematography

Rhetorical Figures in Images

• Synecdoche: Showing only a part to represent the whole.
• Personification: Attributing human characteristics to something or an animal, generating sympathy and familiarity with the advertised product.
• Metaphor: Replacing the image of something with another to appropriate its qualities.
• Contradiction: Placing apparently realistic things or people in a situation that common sense would never combine.

Camera Angles

• Horizontal Angle
• Low Angle (Chopped)
• High Angle (Contrapicat)

Shot Types and Framing

• Extreme Close-Up (PPP)
• Close-Up (PP)
• Medium Close-Up (P Curt)
• Medium Shot (P Mitja)
• American Shot (P America)
• Medium Full Shot (P de Conjunt)
• Long Shot (P General)
• Detail Shot (P Detall)

Depth of Field

• Deep Depth of Field
• Shallow Depth of Field